KoM
by cornwallace
Summary: Doesn't nothin' ever last forever?
1. Room

It begins in a room, if you could call it that.  
Non-descript to the point that it doesn't look real. Solid white - or perhaps pure would be a better word. For a moment they don't exist at all and suddenly they do. Riku and Sora have to take time to process this.  
They don't recall waking up or being awake. They just are.

"My teeth are like fire in my mouth," Sora says, his fingertips to his mouth. "I don't think this has happened yet."

"This never was and never will be." Riku is blind. Underneath the blindfold he wears his eyes are mangled and useless - stuffed into his brain by the thumbs of his smaller companion. But that's another story for another time.

In the middle of the room there is a chest and Sora is unsure how to open it without bonking it with the keyblade. He squats to get a closer look. The chest is small. He traces the keyhole with his finger. His eyes wander in thought and the sign catches his eye. Not a sign. A framed piece of paper with bold black text on it. Hanging on the white wall. Seems like thin air.  
The message is clear but it can't be that easy, can it?

"We should probably think about getting out of here," Sora says, dropping his gaze back down to the chest. To the keyhole he's fingering.

"Why?"

"It's not real," he idly replies.

"One cannot define their reality."

"When did you get so cryptic?"

"Around the same time you started calling me Ansem and forced your thumbs through my eyes and into my brain."

"Huh. A straight answer. How chic. Is this the dawn of a new Riku?"

"Not likely. This is no more dawn than it is dusk. We exist outside of time. There will be no recollection of this in our waking lives. This isn't the first time and it won't be the last."

"I'm not a fan of this. I haven't been for a long time."

"That's what this is, isn't it? A venue for your existential crisis. What a shit show."

"Excuse me if I don't care. I'm too tired to deal with this right now."

"You're too tired to deal with anything. You've spent over seven years in stasis, slowly deteriorating."

"I thought you said time didn't exist here."

"I say a lot of things, Sora. Your silence is complacency."

There is not a nightmare before them. A simple action, a show of affection. There's something between them, but it's not an obstacle they didn't build themselves.  
Sora laughs but he doesn't know why. But we do. Some of us do.

"There's a lot left out of everything," Sora says. He stuffs the tip of his pinky into the keyhole of the chest and it clicks in, nice and tight. He turns it. The chest is small. Not sure if established yet but there you go. "I'll be the familiar stink on your knuckle!"

"You couldn't if you tried," Riku says, offense hangs over his voice like a chandelier over a lovely ballroom.  
That is to say, Sora can tell something is wrong.

He knows something is wrong and ignores it. The howling wind would bang the shutters, were it a cabin they were in but alas. 'Twas nothing but a white room. Or "room", if you could call it that.  
Where they exist is on a plane between space and time. But you didn't need me to explain that, did you?  
There's a god somewhere in all of this that's saying no. That's reprimanding you for your selfish desires. Punishing Sora on your behalf.

Do you like it when Sora is punished?

The silent never speak.

Sora remembers the duck turning inside out. Sora remembers the death of a knight. It pains him in such a way that shant be described.  
"There's not a whole lot left to blame it on, is there?" Riku's words are cold. Sora tries to ignore how much that stings.

"I can't summon the keyblade," he says.

"How oh how are you gonna open that chest, pumpkin?"

Sora makes a face at the condescension. Riku smirks.  
Riku may be blind but he's very aware of his surroundings.

Sora always felt insecure around Riku. Inadequate. He doesn't like that feeling, which is why he thinks he's drawn to Kairi.  
He wishes Kairi was there. Riku wishes Sora could see what he could. It's painful for both of them.

Sora changes his position, sitting cross legged in front of the chest instead of squatting. He gets comfortable.  
"To stand and consider all possibilities..." he mutters to himself. Riku's smirk fades.

"There's only one thing that will open that door."

"How do you know about the door?"

"I know a lot of things."

"Do you know where we are?"

"No."

Scoff. "Some sage."

"My surroundings only feed me a limited amount of information. Just the immediate what, not the why. Much like your own eyes."

"Cryptic."

"Hardly. What does the sign say?"

"What?" Sora blinks.

"The sign. What does it say?"

"The framed words on the wall?"

"Yes."

"I don't know."

"Yes you do."

"No, I mean. It's nonsense. Gibberish. Doesn't make any sense."

"Ah."

Sora sighs and scratches his head. His hair is a mess. He taps the top of the chest three times with his index and middle finger and nothing happens.  
"I'm out of ideas."

"There's not a whole lot you can accomplish if you don't even try, Sora."

"Thanks. You're helping." Sarcasm.

"You noticed the keyhole on the chest but did you bother to see if it was even locked?"

"Oh, jeez. That's brilliant Riku. What oh what would I do without you." Sora rolls his eyes and opens the chest. He blinks. "Huh. It opened."

"What's inside?"

"A vile of mystery goo, a handgun and a photograph."

"What's on the photograph?"

"I don't know. Memories."

"Are you being cute?"

"No, I- ... It's hard to explain. My brain isn't processing what I'm seeing with my eyes beyond waves of raw emotion. I'm looking at a paradox. It's blurry and it's clear. Like trying to read or type in a dream. It's frustrating to look at."

"Raw emotion?"

"Yeah."

"What do you feel?"

"I don't want to talk about that."

"Typical. You're never going to get your shit together with that attitude."

"Maybe I don't want to get my shit together. Maybe I'm happy just self-destructing. How's that?"

"You'd be taking the universe with you. Tearing down existence in a selfish act of weakness and cowardice. You aren't imprisoned, you are the prison."

"Is that why the keyblade chose me?"

A genuine laugh. "You still think you're the hero, don't you?"

"No." A defeated sigh. "I'm no hero. I'm not even good."

"Then what the hell makes you think the keyblade chose you? What makes you think you're special in any capacity? Perhaps you can't currently summon the weapon because it doesn't belong to you. It never did."

Sora tries not to cry, but silently, he does. He sniffles and picks up the gun.

"The magazine is soldered to the gun." His voice is irregular.

"Is it loaded?"

"I, uh." He pulls the slide back just enough to see a cartridge in the chamber. "Yes. I dunno if it's blanks or bullets but there's something in there."

"Only one way to find out."

Sora aims and fires the weapon at the words. The bang of the gun going off leaves a ringing in Sora's ears but the words are unaffected. He fires three more times. Nothing. He drops his hand into his lap and the gun along with it. Head hanging slack. Hyperventilating.  
Icy fingertips touch the back of his neck. Startled, he reacts violently. Turning as his hand tightens desperately around the pistol. Squeezing the trigger. Riku's blood splatters hard across the surreal white surface of the room. Half of Riku's heart is missing and his brain matter is collecting in pools of blood on the floor before Sora realizes the mistake he's made. His eyes widen in horror. He calls out to his corpse over the ringing in his ears. He awkwardly catches the limp body as it collapses onto him, cradling him and turning over to hover over his side.

There's no finality to any of this, which is a concept Sora doesn't seem to understand.

A bittersweet smile is drained from Riku's face. A sob escapes Sora as he leans over to plant a kiss on the cadaver's cold lips before collapsing into an emotional shuddering pile into his neck and chest.

The door behind them opens.


	2. Hallway

Sora giggles.  
"It was THAT easy?!"

"Yeah," Riku laughs. "I guess it was."

"With this kinda power," Sora starts, skipping his way through the doorway and turning around to pose as he crosses, "we can do ANYTHING!"

Riku smiles with his eyes closed, gives the thumbs up.  
He makes his way across the threshold and the door shuts behind him. Startled, he stumbles into Sora. Sora catches him, the momentum pushing his back against the wall. Riku blushes and Sora kisses him. They've never been happier.

This moment lasts a century in some capacity. The kiss breaks and Riku helps Sora straighten himself out. He readjusts his pants and underwear and hopes Riku doesn't notice.  
He looks up, blushing. Riku's attention is on something else. His ear and neck exposed.

Sora smiles devilishly. He starts licking towards Riku's collarbone all the way up to his earlobe, which he nibbles on a bit.

"Sora," Riku says, sternly grabbing his collar.

"Riku," Sora whispers into his ear, sending a shudder down his spine. Sora is proud of himself, though it doesn't last long.  
Riku's fist, still tightened around Sora's collar, bounces him gently against the wall behind him. Nodding, he catches his attention on the bloody footprints leading down the hall in what seems to be the antithesis to the void.

Pure light.

Sora's eyes widen. The shoe prints look familiar.  
His gaze meet's Riku's. He's got his serious face on.

"Sora, I'm gonna go check this out. We'll cover more ground if you go that way."

"If... I go that way?"

"Yes."

"Okay, you're trying to protect me and you're doing a bad job of it. Whatever was injured went that way. Probably away from the thing that hurt him like this."

"It probably went after him."

"Maybe, but maybe not. We're not in our old world anymore. That whole half of the building could literally be the mouth of a tentacle monster."

"You've got a point."

Sora's smiling with his eyes closed. "I do!"

Riku laughs. "You said 'I do', that means we're married."

"Goof!" he says, pushing Riku on the shoulder.

Riku gives the peace sign while smiling before dropping the act. "So! What would you do, then? If you were me. Trying to protect you." A sly smile.  
Sora just about hops on his back, his arms around his waist and his chin resting on his shoulder without warning. Riku jumps briefly but quickly settles into it.

"Well," he says, squeezing him a little, "I'd probably tell you to either wait here, which is also another bad idea in case the culprit circles around again, or there's more of them. Or I'd, you know. Tell you to stick behind me. Close. Behind me."

"Sora. My god."

"What?"

"You lay it on thick, don't you?"

"You asked me what I would do and I'm just telling you," he says, tracing a finger along his jawline. "I'd tell you to stay behind me and we'd check it out togetheeer."

"Alright, alright," he laughs. "Let's stick together. C'mon."

Sora detaches himself and grabs his hand, quickly speeding up to a brisk pace to keep up with Riku. He smiles with his eyes closed for a second before he trips and opens them again. He waves. Riku shakes his head and waves back before turning his attention back to the footprints before him.

The further down the hallway they get almost matches the slower they begin to walk. The pure white begins to flicker into darkness, a couple frames at a time. Then more.

"What if this is the tentacle monster."

"We're in a building, Sora. Not a tentacle monster."

"You don't know that. I'm pretty sure this place exists outside of space and time. Some lunatic's dream, I dunno. Either way, anything is possible."

"That's a pretty weak hypothesis, doc."

"You don't know! There could be a bear with a shark made of skin tearing its way out of its stomach to create some kinda goddamn. Sharkbug. With tiny legs that let it scurry along the floor but long enough to let it jump and chomp at your gonads."

"Sora. Gross. Jesus. I'm pretty sure we're just in a building, okay?"

"Then why'd you stop?"

Sora and Riku are standing side by side. Holding hands.  
Riku blushes and scratches the back of his neck with his free hand.

"It's starting to get less light and more dark with every step we take. And the footsteps end just up there."

"Looks like they turned a corner. Or went into a room. It's hard to tell in this place."

"Are you scared?"

"Not with you here," Sora laughs nervously. Tightening his grip on Riku's hand.

Riku looks forward. "I'm not either."

They don't move or speak for a brief moment.

"H-hey, Riku."

"Yeah?"

"Do you remember that girl we used to hang around with all the time?"

"K..airi?"

"No, not her," he says, biting his lip and furrowing his brow. "I remember her perfectly but. No, the other one. Name started with an N, I think. Or was it a B?"

"Sora, I have no idea what you're talking about."

"Definitely an N name. She'd draw us, remember?"

"No."

"We'd fight - at first, we'd fight over who she'd draw next. She always drew us so cute, it was really flattering."

"Are you making this up? Because if you're making this up you should really stop."

"I'm not, I'm serious." Sora tugs on Riku's wrist. "We'd fight about who she'd draw next until we agreed to just get her to draw us together always. You don't remember?"

Riku's head is struck with a sudden pain. He finds support on the wall closest to him and his free hand shoots up to cradle his head.  
"I..."

"Riku..!"  
Sora awkwardly looks for ways to help him but his trouble seems to be eternal. His free hand touches his chest. "Riku?"

"Y-yeah, I'm fine, I just.." Riku lowers his hand to Sora's wrist and grabs it. "I'm overwhelmed... with an emotion."

"I was thinking that if we met Namine at the end of this, she could draw us a better life than the one we had. The one we always wanted."

"Namine...?"

"Yeah! That was her name, wasn't it? Namine! When we would go swimming with Kairi, she'd always hang back and draw the three of us together. Right?"

"Kairi..?"

"Riku? Are you okay?"

"I think I'm fine. I think I'm-"

"Hey." Sora grabs Riku's face and makes him look him in the eyes. "I love you, okay?"

"Ah~"

"It's gonna be okay, okay?" Sora kisses him gently on the cheek and leans back, his hands running down his chest. Smiling with his eyes closed. "I love you."

Riku relaxes a bit and lets out an anxious chuckle. "I love you too."

The moment of silence they share in harmony is cracked open by the sudden gunshot. Riku's eyes widen.  
Sora's head cocks to the side and his brains and skull matter takes its own trajectory. Riku's throat catch a cry of surprise.

Sora's fingertips fall from Riku's trembling grasp and to the floor and Riku chokes on a sob.

Where the footprints end Sora steps out from nothingness. His outfit is different. He's bleeding from his leg, his shoulder and the arm he cradles against himself. He lowers the pistol from eye level to his side. Riku backs up a comical amount of distance.

Sora's good eye focuses in on Riku and he limps forward, spilling out a little of what's left of him with each step.  
Past Sora's corpse. The real Sora as he understands it. On and on past the footprints until he stops when they do.

He catches himself on the wall adjacent to the open door he doesn't notice.  
He looks up to see Sora limping after him, determined.

"I think we should be TOGETHER," Sora half-shouts, even though he doesn't need to. "I think we should get MARRIED RIKU."  
Each step draining him further. He coughs up blood.

Riku looks to the left and sees his own corpse, blindfolded and in black. He begins to scream.


	3. Room II

Riku doesn't have time to really think about what's happening to him despite the tears and the trembling in his hands and fingers.  
Doesn't nothin' ever last forever?  
He spots a chest in the middle of the room close to his corpse. Something he can defend himself with, maybe. There's gotta be something.

The Sora that shot his Sora limping towards him, bleeding profusely from several place. Grunting and whining and bleeding still.  
One breath after another.

Dashing into the room and past the corpse, he opens the chest. Inside it is an electric razor, a stapler, two green irises and a robe. Riku knows what he must do.  
His hands shaking, he throws the robe on.  
The electric razor begins to buzz as he traces it up the center of his forehead towards the back. Silver strands of Riku's hair fall to the floor between him and his chest. He knows what he must do. Once the top of his head is bald the razor clicks off and is returned to the box. The hair is collected and his shaking hands staple clumps of strands messily to his chin and upper lip.  
Noises escape him as he fights off the screams. The corpse behind him opens its mouth slowly and what seems to be the wind blows the blindfold off his face. Hollow eye sockets writhing with parasites. Pulsating.  
Doesn't nothin' ever last forever?  
He holds the iris up to his own.  
One. Two. Three. Snap.  
His screams echo the room.  
One more. This one is harder because he already knows how bad it is.  
Count it, Riku. (do it you fuck) One. Two. Three. (come on!) SNAP.  
Pools of blood collecting at the bottom of his oculars and leaking down the sides of his face, tracing it as his eyelids close, pushing more out.

"FUCK!" Riku screams through grit teeth, throwing the stapler across the room.

His eyes open and his jaw drops as he turns his gaze to the doorway. Sora catching himself on it. Coughing up blood. Sputtering.

"Riku, I... this isn't what it looks like." He's panting. He wipes blood from his lips with his exposed forearm. He takes a step forward. "I had to kill me so I wouldn't kill you. Or h-hurt you. I made a mistake, I-"  
He's cut himself off when he notices Riku's face and Riku's corpse. Festering.  
Attention turns back to the disguise.

"Y-you're not Riku," he stammers. "Wh-what have you done to Riku?"

His voice is layered with that of the Thirteen but his face is still pained and hopeless. Riku is still in there, but he is no longer in control. He speaks through his red soaked beard.  
"Doesn't nothin' ever last forever?"

"What have you DONE to him?!" His fear is replaced with anger. He's ready to strike.

"Your friend lays dead not by our hand, but by your own. Your madness will not save you from consequence."

"You're lying," he says through clenched teeth.

"Your delusions are just that. Delusions."

"You're LYING." He raises the gun. His finger on the trigger guard. Trembling. "Who ARE you?!"

"We are the Thirteen. We constructed this prison for you and you alone. The hypothesis being that your introversion will lead to undeniable Oblivion. So far the experiment has been a resounding success."

"Thirteen, huh?" His weak arm drops the weapon to his side, exhausted. "There's only one of you."

"Present isn't an appropriate concept for the laws of reality we have created within this structure. There is no such definition for your understanding or benefit."

"Didn't you assholes know? Fascism is genuinely a bad form of government for lazy people."

Laughter.  
Crimson streaks running thicker down his face. Riku is in pain.

Rage.  
Sora's had enough. He raises the weapon and opens fire with the pistol. Punching holes through his chest and face and spraying the wall behind him.  
The twitching body falls backwards as he unloads the handgun into him. The slide locks into place as the final casing rains down on him and he examines the weapon before casually tossing it into the corner of the room. He looks to his feet and then he looks to Riku's other corpse.  
Tiny holes seem to have opened around his emptied eye sockets, lined with wormlike creatures. Within the holes, something seems to be flourishing. Something alive.

He leans over and picks up the discarded blindfold and tears fill his eyes as he lets out a heartfelt sob.  
As he's blinking them away, he notices the plaque on the wall decorated with your standard issue wood chopping axe.  
Trying to dry his eyes with his forearm, he smears blood across his face and pockets the blindfold.  
Stepping forward, he picks up the axe with his good arm and examines it.

More laughter. His blood runs cold.  
"Do you remember Namine?" the Thirteen voices ask him. Riku's is gone, though what's left of his disguised body sits up. Half the "beard" blown off his face. Left eye blown through and festering with the same parasites as the other corpse. "You made her a promise, Soraaaa."

Sora slowly turns to look at the horrific thing Riku's other corpse is becoming. His eyes wide with fear. The axe shaking in his hand.  
Choking on his own desperate and useless cries. He takes a step back, speechless.

"Her soul is damned with the rest of them. These are the consequences of your actions."

"Shut up!" He steps forward again, anger taking over again. Backswings the axe threateningly. "Shut UP, you hear?!"

"Her soul rots away along with the rest of her, as she awaits you to fulfill a promise you don't even remember. You don't remember much, do you?"  
They're laughing as they speak. The sound is constant. Sora screams and swings the axe at an awkward angle between the shoulder and the neck and the laughing continues. He struggles to remove it with one hand, putting his foot on the thing's chest and kicking it to the floor upon exit and the laughing continues. He screams as loud as he can and strikes the body again, cracking its bones and chipping away very slowly but surely at the integrity of the structure and the laughter continues.

Sora's not as much dismembering the body as he is mashing it into itself, chopping away irregularly as he screams. The head caving in more and more with each swing. Resembling a tenderized pile of meat. He doesn't even strike with the blade anymore. He just kind of hammers away with the top of the weapon clumsily and arbitrarily while screaming and crying into the collapsing void. And the laughter continues.

Until he falls to his knee, steadying himself on the handle of the axe and reaches his damaged hand into his pocket. He feels the weight of it, the significance.  
When he retrieves the trinket Kairi gave him after they had sex for the first and only time, the laughter stops and his eyes widen. He does not see the trinket that Kairi gave him to hold onto after the first and only time they had sex.

He can see her bloating dead body with her white hair in her white dress in the back of his mind.  
Sora sees something Namine never gave him, and his eyes widen as he remembers the promise he never made.


	4. Room III

"I'm thinking."

Little Sora and Little Riku are laying on the floor in the room, on either side of the closed chest. Little Sora's head adjacent to Little Sora's feet and vice versa.  
Little Riku twiddles his little thumbs as he stares at the ceiling, bored. A snot bubble grows and shrinks in tandem with Little Sora's quiet cartoon-like snoring. One arm draped across his chest, cradling as if he were wounded, the other sprawled akimbo as his legs. Little Riku notices.

"Sora," he says. No response. He says it louder. "Sora. SORA."

Little Sora's eyes flutter open. "Hrnn..?"

"Are you asleep?"

"No," he says without thinking. Then he feels bad about lying, briefly. "Yes."  
Wiping the sleep from his eyes and yawning, he suddenly realizes it technically wasn't a lie because he's awake now. "Not anymore. What's up?"

"Oh, I was just thinking."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah."

"That's cool," Little Sora says, yawning again and stretching. Rubbing the top of his left foot with the bottom of his right foot comfortably. He blinks. "I think sometimes."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah. You're not alone."

"That makes me feel a bit better."

Little Sora smiles. "I'm glad."

"Sora?"

"Yeah?"

"What happens to us?"

"What do you mean?"

"Like." Little Riku bites his lip and furrows his brow. "What happens to us in life? Do we go on adventures? Are we friends forever?"

"I hope so. Why do you ask?"

"I dunno."

"Is this what you were thinking about?"

"No."

"Oh."

"I hope we're friends forever and go on lots of adventures. Out on the sea, off to other worlds. I wanna see what's out there. With you."

"I hope so, too. And - and Kairi can come with us! And Namine! She can draw us on our adventures. And her, too. Haha."

Little Riku looks hurt. Little Sora doesn't seem to notice.  
"You like Kairi, huh?"

"Sure!" Little Sora says, smiling with his eyes closed. "I like all my friends! Even you, Riku."  
Blissfully ignorant.

Little Riku turns his head in the other direction.  
"Yeah but you like her like her."

Little Sora's eyes pop briefly. Startled. Maybe surprised is better. He hadn't really thought about it. He looks over at Little Riku, but Little Riku is looking away.  
"What?"

"You like-like Kairi. I can tell."

He blushes. "Nuh uh!"

"It's okay." It isn't. "I like-like someone too."

"Y-you do?" Little Sora blinks at him a few times but Little Riku still isn't looking.

"Yeah."

"Is it Kairi?" Eyes shifting.

"No."

Little Sora feels relieved by that answer but doesn't acknowledge or even think about why. "Who is it?"

"No."

"What?"

"I'm not telling you who I like-like."

"Awh, c'mon Riku! You can tell me!" Little Sora gives it one of his best patented doofy smiles but Little Riku still isn't looking.

"No."

His gaze returns to the ceiling.  
"Sheesh, you're the one that brought it up."

"You have to guess."

"Huh?"

"You have to guess who I like-like. Then I'll tell you."

"You know I'm not smart enough to do that."

"You're smarter than you give yourself credit for, Sora."

Little Sora shuts his eyes tight to think. "Namine?"

"No."

"See? I'm too stupid!"

"What's going on between you and Namine?"

"What do you mean?"

"You made a promise to her."

Little Sora looks sad.  
"Yeah. I guess I did."

"What did you promise her?"  
Little Riku is looking at Little Sora. Little Sora is looking at the ceiling.

"I promised her that I'd get out of this room. I promised her I wouldn't let her die alone in a room only I have the key to open."

"Do you have the key?"

Little Sora digs in his pocket and pulls out the key.  
He holds it up. He puts it back in his pocket.

"Will you keep your promise?"

"I don't know."

"If you don't know if you'll keep your promise, why did you promise?"

Little Sora feels bad.  
"I don't know. I don't remember making any promises. I don't remember her at all. I just know she's there. I just know I promised."

"That's a horrible way to exist."

"It doesn't feel good, no."

"I'm sorry."

"Don't be. One day I'll be as strong as you because of it."

Little Riku laughs, but he doesn't mean to. "Yeah.."

Sora like-likes more than one person and he doesn't know how to assess or process it.  
Riku like-likes Sora and will forever feel the tinge of jealousy when Sora like-likes anybody else. Or likes, for that matter.  
These emotions have yet to manifest themselves in any understandable capacity to either of them, but even when they do, neither are capable of letting them manifest themselves in any sort of healthy way.  
Just a sickly feeling in the pit of their stomachs.  
A parasite corrupting their hearts.

Little Riku, and Riku for that matter, sometimes wonder what it'd be like to hold hands with Sora or kiss him. He wonders if Sora would only kiss him as he's dying or if they would kiss all the time.  
He likes to think they'd kiss all the time. He likes to think they'd get out of here in no time at all, and find some interesting adventure together, just the two of them.

He smiles warmly and closes his eys, thinking about it.  
"I'm thinking again."

Little Sora looks at him.  
"That's neat."

They decide to pretend the ceiling is a sky and that there are clouds in the sky and that those clouds look like things.

Little Riku points.  
"That one's a rabbit."

"Cool." Little Sora points. "That one's a pterodactyl."

"I don't see it. Looks more like a bird. An eagle, maybe?"

Little Sora's eyes widen. "You think he's after the rabbit?"

"Maybe!" Little Riku says, shrugging. "I wouldn't worry about it much, though. There's his brierpatch."

"Phewf!" Little Sora wipes the sweat off his brow like the cartoon he is. "I see it!"

They both laugh and go quiet.  
Little Riku's arms to his side. Little Sora's cradling his chest, as if he were wounded.

"I don't want to lose you," Little Riku says.

Sadder than Little Riku's ever seen him, he says "I don't want to lose you either."

Little Sora sits up abruptly, noticing the sign and reading it. He blinks a few times. "Riku. I think I know how to get out of here."

Little Riku sits up as well. His back to the sign.

They look at each other.


	5. Hallway II

Sora buries the axe into the floor and drags himself along awkwardly with the one limb he has left intact.  
Half a foot at a time. Maybe less.  
Blood streaking along the floor behind him. Trailing him the width of his body. Guttural noises through the back of his throat accompany his every movement.  
Woozy. How much blood could he have?

Enough, he asserts to himself internally.  
(enough to keep me going)  
(enough to get me out of this)

Trying not to think about what he's done to himself, he pushes forward. The parasites manifesting in the open wound in his hand, infecting his arm with the shadow.  
Lopping it off at the elbow. His arm took three swings before he could tear it off the remaining threads of his skin.  
His legs, however, were meatier. He only meant to take the one opposite the arm he took, but after losing count on his swings he also lost what little precision he had, damaging the upper thigh as he hammered arbitrarily at his infected one with the dull axe. Tearing flesh instead of cutting it. Breaking bones instead of chopping them. Clenching his teeth so hard several of them cracked. He tore away the flesh his infected leg was dangling from but left his butchered other thigh attached, as useless as it was.  
Wistful thinking that it could be fixed. He told himself that. He tries not to think about it.  
(it's going to be okay)  
(lie)  
(you're going to make it)  
(lie)  
(keep going) He pushes it out of his mind. All he knows is pain and progress.  
He brings the axe downward into the floor and stops, trembling. A chill down his spine as someone just walked over his grave. His eyes wide, his pupils as small as pinholes. A spiderweb of bright red veins.  
The lights flicker.

Someone coming.  
He drops th' axe.

A door opens ahead of him and to his right.  
Eyes shut tight. Wide open. He knows whatever it is he can't fight it if he needs to. Whoever it is.  
To assume the worst before it's happened is panic without resolve. If you said this to Sora, he wouldn't understand it.  
But what he sees is somehow worse than a monster or an enemy. What he sees, he isn't prepared for in any capacity.

He sees himself. But not like himself now. Not like a reflection or an image of himself present or future but.. Little Sora. His face expressionless. Cold. He looks down upon Sora in his current, useless state.  
He sees himself as a kid and he only vaguely remembers a time when he didn't hate himself.  
Sora's eyes slowly fill with tears and his fingers and hand begin to tremble and shake as he raises it towards his past with a brighter future. He desperately tries to find the words. He'd give anything to figure out what he could say to this kid so that he'd keep his confidence and not turn into the him that he is today.

But the words don't come. Not words at all.

"Ah~~ ahhh~"  
His trembling fingers weakening. What little strength he has left is just draining. Nothing ever happens the way he wants it to. He loses everything that's important to him and he can't even say that. His hand drops and he makes a futile effort to drag himself close on his wrist and forearm. He travels maybe a fraction of an inch.

Little Sora closes his eyes and shakes his head before looking himself in the face once again, with his cold, dead expression.

"Pathetic," he says.  
Little Sora turns his back on himself and flickers out of existence as he saunters down the hallway.

Sora's head gives way to gravity and meets the floor. Tears quietly leak from his face for a moment or two before he bleeds to death.


	6. Room IV

**A time lapse of Namine dying and decomposing.**  
 _a play by cornwallace._

* * *

Namine's room isn't like the others.

For starters, it's not made of light.

It's made of darkness.

There is no door.

There is no sign.

Instead of a sign there's just a mess of ancient cathode ray tube television sets poorly stacked on top of one another behind a wall of plexiglass. Casting the only light that glows over her.

On the screens she sees different angles from different security cameras. Different Sora's killing and being killed.  
She isn't sure which one will find her, or if one ever will.

Namine appears in different positions in different places of the room.

Pacing back and forth.

Sitting, leaning against a corner.

Pounding on the plexiglass and crying and shouting at the Sora's on the screens that can't hear her.

Nobody can, except for maybe the Thirteen. Even them, she doesn't understand how or why they'd listen.  
She brought him here - she holds no value to them anymore.

Sometimes she breaks down and cries.

Sometimes she convinces herself it's okay. That it'll be okay. That a Sora will come and save her from this prison outside of space and time.

After awhile, she feels like crying but there isn't any physical output. She's dehydrated. She isn't sure how long she's been without water, but she's certain she's been much longer without food. As time passes she loses more and more weight.

Namine gets smaller and smaller. Her skin begins to hang off her bones as it loses elasticity, often momentarily staying before shrinking back to normal when misplaced.  
She vomits bile into a corner and tries to stay away from it for as long as she can until she begins vomiting bile again.

She begins to wonder how these bodily functions are affecting her existence outside of space and time, or if this breed of suffering was merely orchestrated by the Thirteen themselves.  
A ticking clock element, so to speak.

She begins to wonder if Sora can see her, or if he's even received the illusion she'd projected onto his consciousness of a promise he'd never made.  
She didn't enjoy playing such a trick, but she was left no choice. He was her only chance of survival.

As the architect of this Oblivion, she is prisoner to her own construct.  
She is unsure of everything in regards to the Thirteen. What they are, where they come from. What they want. The extent of the power they hold over her.

She knows fear. She knows pain. She begins to know and accept that she is going to die as her muscles begin to atrophy and it becomes increasingly more difficult to crawl to and away from her puking corner.

Eventually she collapses and her muscles begin to spasm seemingly arbitrarily.

She pictures Sora's face smiling instead of scared or angry. She wishes she had a pen and some paper, and that she could move voluntarily so that she could draw it for him. She always imagined drawing him so many pictures in so many places, sketching out everything meaningful that ever happened to him. She doesn't know if she can draw, she's never tried. But she imagines she could! She imagines she could draw him when he's happy, that she could draw him when he's sad or angry. That look on his face when he's finally discovered something profound about himself.

Namine passes away.

Her body adjusts temperature.

Muscle tissue stiffens and becomes incapable of relaxing. Over time, her flesh adopts a bluish tint after becoming increasingly pale.

Gases build up under her skin and cause her body to bloat unnaturally.

Her loosened and inflated skin begins to tear apart.

Blisters begin to rupture.

Maggots infest and voraciously eat away every natural and unnatural orifice in and on her body.

Decomposition fluids purge from the body into a chalkline like stain on the darkness beneath her.

The maggots retreat from the body to pupate.

What's left of her flesh begins to dry onto her bones and cartilage.

Nothing else may be asked of her.

* * *

The ocean swells as she sees him in the distance.

Covering her eyes with her flat hand, shielding them from the sun.

She can only see his silhouette, but she knows that's him out there.

She calls out to him and waves and the shadow responds, his attention grabbed by her.

Taking enough steps forward for him to come into focus.

Sora, out there, knee deep in salty water. Looking back at her with some sort of mix between confusion and admiration.

She takes the notebook from the bag around her shoulder and snatches the pen from the spiral.

And quickly, quietly, she begins to sketch.

Ready, able.

Recent adventures to the world of a silly ol' bear plague her vision of this vista and herself included.

She's drawn him hopping with tigers, getting hunny for bears, finding baby pigs and desperately trying to keep them all from destroying one another.

Namine shields her eyes once more to look at him out on the horizon and he isn't there anymore. She's not sure if he ever was.

Her fantasies have caught up with her.

She looks down at her drawing and sees a world where she could tell him what really happened, even though she's scared.

A world where her defect doesn't outweigh her very existence.

"Sora," she says. "I'm sorry."

"Namine," he doesn't say, not reaching towards her. "Please don't cry."

"I know," she sobs, "I have no right to cry after what I've done to you."

"That's not it," he doesn't say and never says. "If you cry, I'll cry. And if I cry, everything will fall apa-

* * *

Namine never truly existed in a capacity we could comprehend, but she was a biproduct of Kairi's loss of innocence. An extension of Kairi's soul that got lost somewhere in the void.  
What beginnings she had was met with a short span and a cosmic entity that manifested itself to her as thirteen members of some kind of cult or something in black robes with black hoods and a mysterious ability to orchestrate destiny on an unseen level.

Namine tried her best. Her name will not be remembered.


	7. Kingdom of memories

"Sora, do you remember that time you crapped your pants when we were kids?"

"I uh." Sora lies through his teeth. "No recollection of that whatsoever."

"You gotta be shitting me, dude!" She punches him on the shoulder, intending the pun. "Namine drew that shit and everything. Your brown pants browner and swollen around your Poopoo Place™," she says pointing to his butt. "Stinklines and everything. It was incredible. You had this innocent look of wonder on your face with a single tear rolling down your cheek while I made it okay."

"You made it okay, huh?" Sora actually doesn't remember this.

"You really don't remember what I told you?"

"Not at all."

"I told you pooping your pants was gross, Sora. You knew that and I knew that. But that doesn't make YOU gross."

"What? I-"

Kairi shushes Sora with a finger to his lips and a quiet and sly "shhhhhh."

Shortly after, they had sex for the first and only time, and Sora made a way bigger deal out of it than he should have, if we're being honest.

* * *

Some might think it should be a bigger event when the Thirteen first appear to him as the physical manifestation of themselves.  
Little Sora watches them appear from right to left, one at a time.

And when they finally appear, Little Sora is beyond words.

Just as they are.

All possibilities are drawn out before his understanding under the condition that he forget this as soon as he leaves the room.  
Everything that can and will happen to Sora in his lifetime happens to Little Sora within the blink of an eye. Were he not fortified by the Thirteen he might collapse under the strain of it all.

Instead, he feels nothing.

Nodding, he demonstrates an understanding.

The possibilities flutter away like a million angels and flies, obscuring the sky and sunlight that isn't present, yet casting a very real shadow upon them.

As they scatter, a hooded figure steps forward, extending a hand. He feels some sort of bond or kinship with this figure.

A token, or maybe an artifact.

Something to keep him alive in some capacity in the next stage of existence.

Little Sora reaches up and takes the object from the stranger's hand.

He clutches it to his chest as if he were wounded and steps back as the shadowed figure does the same.

From right to left, they disappear, one at a time.

Until there is nothing left but Little Sora and the object in his closed hand.

Fingers turn upward to reveal a popsickle stick.

On the stick there is a joke.

The joke makes Little Sora's eyes fill up with tears.

* * *

Riku stabs a sea urchin through his hand trying to find something to bop Sora with and begins laughing like a jock with mild head trauma. He gets up off his ass and mostly out of the water and smacks Sora in the face with his open hand, sea urchin first.

The spines stabbing into him break off into splinters in his hand and cut their way through Sora's cheek and gums. Crashing against his teeth.

Splintering upward.

Sora laughs out a mouthful of blood before patting Riku on the back congratulatory.

Riku rings in Sora's neck with his arm and laughs with him, giving him a bloody noogie.

"G- **\- KKTT KKT-** dead!" Kairi screams, running past Namine, who's drawing everything. "You guys don't understand! GO-

* * *

 _Namine draws it as it is happening._

* * *

"I regret it," Sora says, hugging himself as if he's been wounded. "I dunno, I just. We didn't do it right, did we? We consummated in poison."

"I guess you're right," she says. "I guess I do regret it."

Sora briefly regrets regretting it as if her not regretting it would attract or persuade him to the idea.

But, it was regrettable.

And as the dark sun sets over the end of the world, Sora asks nobody in particular when the sun became dark and when the ocean turned black and nobody answered, letting him know that this hasn't happened yet and

Sora rests his mind and lays back closing his eyes.

Kairi isn't there anymore and maybe she never was, but Sora senses another presence.

* * *

Little Sora reaches up to the keyhole with the key in hand and stuffs it in.

He turns it until he can twist the knob.

The door opens and he walks into the darkness that consumes him.  
The door ceases to exist.

Before him, the decomposed remains of Namine pointing at the giant flower pod on the other side of the room.

She is dead but her message carries on.

A promise to forget this and return to his life.

Blessings to her corpse in all such manner.

Sora becomes ambitious and vows to carry her on with him, forever.

Accepting another ghost to be haunted by in any such capacity.

He takes off his clothes and he enters the pod and he is to be consumed by it for however long it takes.

Little Sora imagines himself tearing her drawings off the wall and putting them carefully into several binders and packing them away.

As his body and bones grow, as does he retain the scope of his memories, it all happens too quickly, within the pod.

Things quite don't quite make the full capacity of sense anymore.

Be with your demons. _**Be with them.**_

* * *

As Sora stumbles out of the pod, aged to present, coughing and sputtering, all his memories come flooding back to him at once.

Sora remembers everything. _Everything_.  
Namine had lied to him. She had broken the promise she had never made to him in a fit of cosmic irony, because she doesn't exist and has never existed in any sort of capacity that he or I will never fully comprehend.

Her corpse has been removed.  
He's not in the same room he was.

Sora stands naked and stumbles to his knees aside the River Styx.  
Screaming and clawing at his scalp until his hair is matted with blood.

No matter what he does or how hard he tries, the avalanche of memories doesn't stop.


End file.
